Paramount

Bury Me

Bury me somewhere that’s quiet
Far from the sounds of war
A place for quiet contemplation
Where peaceful thoughts helpfully restore
Bury me somewhere that’s quiet
Not left under piles of rubble
Give me the plot I desire
A place that avoids any trouble
Bury me somewhere that’s quiet
Away from the gun and the shell
Away from the pounding of cannons
Where silently forever I’d dwell
Bury me somewhere that’s quiet
Far from the cries and the screams
Away from the sounds of the dying
Where peace is the stuff of dreams
Bury me somewhere that’s quiet
And not one with all of the boys
In life they were war time comrades
But I’m fed up with all of that noise
Bury me somewhere that’s quiet
My last and final request
This soldier is ever so tired
And needs to peacefully rest

CHILDREN AT THE GATE
.  
In revenge, we have set fire  
to our mother's womb  
where all life emerged,  

where the shadows of  
countless pillars of smoke  
fill the skies of oceans  

from coffers burst open  
pouring forth stains of  
prehistory risen from the dead  

by the reckless children  
let loose upon the shores  
of glacier salt licks  

to haze the land with deserts  
that choke her arteries;  
the relentless march to the sea  

where there is no welcome,  
to ravage the spices of her  
jeweled neck and arms, to  

lay barren her thousand bosoms,  
to defile our first and only home  
that lays at our feet waiting  

as our yearning gaze points us  
to the starry firmament  
until at last we might implore  

O Earth Mother, forgive us  
before you cast us out of Eden!  
and of course, she does  

with her blessings, in spite  
contempt for our birthright  
(it belongs to us, we reason)  

too short-lived and fragile  
by our own hand to earn it,  
so we try and take it  

for we are the brazen children  
who forsake her, and  
play with the keys to the gate  

which bars our way to the  
knowledge in the shadow of  
the pillars of fire;  

they cannot be extinguished  
while at war with ourselves,  
much to our mother's grief  



https://deepundergroundpoetry.com/poems/233726-children-at-the-gate/

Leave Me Here

The water is swallowing me up whole
And I am left without enough oxygen to
Breathe. I fight to keep my control,

But I want to fade away and turn blue
Because I am tired of being everyone
Else’s anchor. I am done being the glue

To hold everything together. Take the gun
And shoot me in the heart because I would
Rather die than live in misery. Take the sun

Away because I want to sink to where I should
Be, at the bottom surrounded by complete
Darkness and blackness. I am just driftwood

And utterly useless. I am not tidy or neat.
I would rather be messy and bloody so that
I can be ignored or passed by on the street

Without a second glance. I could be flat
Like a cardboard box and you would still never
Look my way. Hit me right in the gut

And it is guaranteed to hurt. It is better to sever
This while we still can rather than regretting
It all in the end. I would never have to endeavor

Or burden anybody again. You will be forgetting
Me soon enough just like everybody else has. So
While you are the one who is jetting

Off somewhere else and new, I want you to show
Me that I am right by leaving me here to wilt away
Just like everything else. I want to feel every low.

I’m Broken

I’m broken
Fractured in the place underneath the core
Where the structure of existence and foundation lie
Where the texture of abstract thought has torn

It’s the phase when faith and creed are shaken
Reveling in the freedom of what the revelation brought
Wrought ceaselessly by the eons of perilous times
When then the vain and futile plans have come to naught

It’s the sinister void of all reason and purpose
The rupture in the framework of the mind
Slivering away, slowly caving in, unreeling
Till all the unholy fears are lived and wholly realized

Conflicted amid the ruins of lust and judgment
At the site where reflection has lost its drive
I’m frayed deep within the heart and spirit
That I love and loathe all of it at the same time

But still I strive to mend my errant ways
Trying to make some sense of it of all
Reticent and remorseful for the wasted days
Withered away in shattered pieces that took their toll

And yet the more I ponder the more I become flawed
The façade of phantom memories remain unspoken
Like gods and monsters at the table patiently awaiting
For the tipping point, unbalanced where I am broken

http://i1347.photobucket.com/albums/p703/aragornr/proxies_smaller_zpsxi682spk.jpg

Proxies

My daughter would have been twenty-five
if her birth had not been her death
Grace by name but not by fate
back in the year of 91
in Charity Hospital I witnessed
labor felt as pain progressed
no living soul was at the end.

After quarter century I still stand
daughter's ashes on the shelf
no children have filled my house
now I see these surrogates
young adults on the brink
so bright to step out on their own
with potential none shall deny.

I can see them as the promise
talented with a splash of wit
smile to light the entire world
compassion to cry when it's due
with so much to learn along the way
the future asking what they will do
these things I believe she would be.

Still I fear for these ones
facing trials I never met
when I was their age in the time
before they were born or soon after
in the now the world is cursed
by technology and human progress
with traps Grace will never know.

I long to see where they'll land
as fortune moves them down the road
bound to make their destiny
tossing aside the chains of hate
world's salvation in their hands
substitutes for the one not here
my daughter's proxies in my world.

never ever

to be the one that has to choose
must be so terrible
to be the one who has to lose
the very most inevitable

three weeks here have i been
growing deep inside
never heard or seen
wish i could run and hide

no chance for me to see the day
your mind already made
never once will i pray
into nothingness i'll fade

you chose my future and my past
for me there is no tale
i hope the memory of me will last
now forgive me as i turn pale

pehaps my memory in some form
is my chance to live
from your whomb i am now torn
mom,....you i forgive

Campaign

The first time, we walk into love
Like an infant walking into no-man's land.
All around us, brilliance and sound,
Lights and colours,
And no thought of shields or weapons.
We are, of course, mortally wounded.

The next time, remembering the first,
We seek again the vision and the moment,
The headlong rush, the reckless loss of self.
But now, from the corner of the eye, we notice movement,
And when the end comes, though it devastates,
We realize that it was half-foreseen.

And so, on.
As time goes by, we gird ourselves;
Reluctantly, we learn the use
Of plans and strategies:
What favours us, and what we should avoid.
But, knowing, still we court the coup de grâce.

We cannot now be innocent,
We cannot shed the baggage that we bear.
And yet, among the broken masonry,
We look for what we started out to find:
Brilliance and sound,
Lights and colours,
And someone other than ourselves to know.

Glamorous heaven

Wanted to sing without a body
but the mirror between myself and I  
was reflecting a useless need
to rest my head
on a glamorous heaven
free of sound and movement
full of tears and innocence  
planting my soul
uprooting my destination.

Mouth full of grit
...inspired by Leonard Cohen's A thousand kisses deep...listen to the song to get thefeel for the flow    
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7NA3ah_cRY

your chrysalis  
falls  
time it calls  
& shatters  
at my feet  
releasing you  
into  
the blue  
to be set free  
of me  
i take the shards  
shuffle the cards  
inject them  
into  
my blood so deep  
you trip my mind  
I feel it climb  
into your masterpiece  
I fade within  
succumbed by sin  
it is  
my  
only  
peace  
& after all  
the church bells  
call  
I rest here  
on my knees  
wishing you  
would come back to  
the hell  
you shared with me  
after a while  
i give a smile  
to my  
incomplete  
when nighttime  
comes  
I lay with guns  
& wander  
empty streets  
& after all  
i find you  
there  
a thousand kisses deep  

Congratulations to poetryaccident. That was quite a wonderful piece. And thanks for picking me (and my fellow runner-up Jade-Pandora). It was quite an honor to pick a piece for this contest.